Recollections of Thomas A. Curtis, W8BMJ

A
little pre-WLC background: I was in service (USCG) from
August
1942 until Oct. 1945, and learned CW in the Coast Guard radio school at
Atlantic City. I graduated in March of 1944, and went from there to my
first assignment at NOG
at the Soo. I'm also a musician, and when I got out of the service I
went on the road with a trio in 1946. Starting in Jan. 1947 I
attended Central Radio & TV School in Kansas City, MO for a
year on
the GI Bill and received my 1st phone license, 2nd telegraph and CAA
flight radio operator certificate. I also got my ham ticket
at this time and was assigned W8BMJ. TWA hired me in Feb. of 1948, and
I
spent about 2 months at the TWA school in Kansas City before starting
as a Flight Radio Operator.

Tom Curtis in TWA uniform - 1949Archivist
Note: There is a photo of Tom
at the WLC controls on the WLC
main page.

After
several years with TWA I was furloughed so I took a job at WLC early in
1953. I worked there until March 29 of 1954 when I returned to TWA. I
stayed there until the Flight Radio Operator positions were abolished
in June of 1957 when SSB took over from CW. After a short
stint
at air traffic control (not for me) I went to back to WLC and remained
there from 1958 until Oct. 1, 1962 when I left to work at WSL
Amagansett Radio on Long Island, NY and stayed until that station
closed in 1984. #

I'll never forget the day in 1953 when I
walked into WLC and saw the big console and no markings on any of the
many, many switches. They marked them with a red pencil when a new guy
came in those days. While at WLC in '53-'54. I lived in Petersville in
a
rented house that was later taken over by the quarry and became a big
hole!!!

Before I started to stand watches Station Manager, Bob
Crittendon, gave me the Great Lakes Red Book and checked
various fleets
for me to memorize along with a list of navigational check points with
Indian and French names and how the steamer captains. pronounce them
!!! I really wondered what I had gotten into. It was different, but I
found that we gave them real personal service. They just had to say
"morning message" and we knew where it was supposed to be delivered by
the ships name. They never gave a destination, thus the
reason to
memorize the fleets.

Another problem for a new operator were
the telephone lines plus the teletype printers. The bells all sounded
alike at first, but after a short time you could pick out each one by
its tone. The Western Union printer was the old type where you pasted
its strip output on the blanks. If a union sent messages to
60 or so
ships someone came in on O.T. to paste them up for the records.

During the time I was there it was mostly phone with 20 or so
CW messages per day. Sundays
usually had a single operator and we would sometimes handle two
calls at once - a little tricky but you had one in your phones and
reached over to the next position and put that one on the speaker and
usually it worked out OK. Gale warnings could keep you busy as
you gave them on phone first and
then on CW after the first silent period, and sometimes you had
warnings for all the lakes.

When the Bradley
sank in 1958 the lawyers descended on the town and it was not a pretty
sight. I knew a few of the guys who were lost - not well - but had a
few beers with some of them.

Winter Work:

I
really enjoyed the time at WLC although the winter and the winter work
was another story, but I survived it. The station closed from mid
December until mid March so winter work (starting just after Jan. 1, as
I recall) was different. The operators were on electricians
gangs, not installing radios, but any kind of general wiring on
steamers berthed for the winter. I still remember how cold
that
winter work was. They had some pot-bellied stoves and electric heaters
on the steamers, and you were warm if you were within a foot of the
stove. It was really hard working on deck. You were working
with
number 8 wire, and the slightest bump gave you a big welt that lasted a
very long time. I well remember one winter being in the Chief
Engineer's cabin and drilling through a double plate and breaking drill
bits over and over. I saved a piece of the plate to remind me never to
bitch about working conditions again on any other job. I think Harvey
Peltz was with me on that one. One day the wind was blowing almost a
gale and some people were up from
the Detroit office. It was so bad that one of the bosses
said, "The men can't work under
these conditions" and sent everyone home.

More than half the guys went
ice fishing - I wasn't among them. We would stop at a local bar, and I
would down 3 or 4 straight shots and I really don't like them as I
like mixed drinks. When I got home I'd get in a tub
of hot water,
and it was the only time I was warm the entire
day!!!

While I was there I think that Frank Sager worked the winter
at WLC
doing anything that needed to be done as I don't remember seeing him on
any of the electricians gangs, but I could be wrong.

After
I left WLC they stayed open through the winter one year as a test
program of some kind kept the harbors open and ice breakers used where
needed. I'm not sure what year that was, and I think it was
only
the one year as the normal procedure was to close in mid Dec.

Some Amusing Incidents:

Bob
Crittendon for all his stern appearance had a great sense of humor and
he would tell jokes on himself also - one being the on-off switch on
his radio at home. It needed a new control and Bob kept putting it off
and for a very long time his wife had to plug the radio into the wall
plug to turn it on and pull the plug to turn it off.

Another time
he was very upset with the phone company about the teletype and called
to talk to the manager, and they kept putting him off saying they would
call him back etc. Finally Bob said, "No, don't call me back, I'll wait
until I'm this mad again and call you back"

At the entrance to
the station we had a weed growing - one of the cactus family with
prickly leaves. Bob kept spraying it products that were
supposed
to kill it and nothing worked. One day he was out there
attacking
it with a blow torch, and the phone rang. It was one of the company big
wigs from Detroit calling. I went outside to let Bob know,
and he
said, "Tell them I'll be right with them," and I said, "Should I tell
them what you're doing?" and he said, "Noooo."

Sometimes
on our day off we had a not-too-often habit of playing tricks
on
one of the on-duty operators. For Example: We
quite often got a call from a steamship company asking to speak to the
Captain on a steamer - so we would pick one that we knew sank sometime
before and call the station, and if this operator answered, we would
ask to
speak to the steamer's Captain. I still remember the steamer
-
the Henry Steinbrenner - the same company that later owns the NY
Yankees baseball team. It kinda backfired this one time as Bob (Station
Manager) was
sitting in as it was real busy. After the operator called
"Steamer Henry
Steinbrenner - Rogers City calling," another ship
dialed in and Bob took
the call, and the ship said, "He's been on the bottom for 5 years,
Rogers
City." Bob answered "I know, Capain, thank
you."
The next day there was a note up reading "The
horseplay
with - operator's name - will cease immediately"

Of course, Bob
used to tell about the tricks he played - like one operator who would
fall asleep with his feet propped up on the dynamotor and they would
turn it on to make him jump.

Bob related that one of the early lakes stations was on
Mackinac Island (Archivist
Note: WLD)
and he didn't get too much traffic so he had a very long cord on his
headphones so he could work in his garden. When he got a call he would
run like hell, and more often than not another station would steal the
ship. So he complained to the FCC, and Bob said that the FCC
sent
a notice out about it.

# = Editors Note:
While at WSL Tom received a very nice complementon his "fist." The author of the
complement was the head of Press
Wireless.WSL
sent "press" every evening to the ships.